I'm looking to replace shock absorbers (Middlebridge/ Se6) and hear horror stories in particular about poor quality rubber bushes supplied. I do not want poly bushes and I don't need racing quality shocks, just good quality road going jobbies.
Shock absorbers must have (1) adjustable spring seats to accept the original springs (diameters and lengths), (2) have variable damping control, (3) good rubber bushes.
So, of the regular suppliers who do we think has best offering?

AVO had a problem with poly bushes many years ago - all sorted now AFAIK. I've used Gaz (a long time ago), Spax (on almost all of my cars now after a tour of the factory by the Scimitar owning tech director) and Protech (alloy bodied on G97, much cheaper than you'd think and a small company who are really nice people to deal with), all of which meet your requirements.

Those bushes were the latest ones that AVO had been issuing specifically to sort the distortion problem. Very disappointing that genuine factory replacement bushes have failed so quickly. So far I haven't seen the problem on Spax.

We're the Gaz shocks on poly or rubber? My rubber are still good after 4/5 years.however my AVOs on poly that are only a year older are totaly knackered bushes oval and the shocks themselves leak like mad added to that the coating they put on is pretty much none existent. On the flipside my Gaz fronts finish still good (yes not as shiny as when fitted) no leaks and work well.
The spax my dad had on his 6 lost their gas after a few years (not to many I might add) so we're replaced with Gaz.

There's probably not a great faultless option out there so I guess it's preference!
At the moment I have old Konis on the rear of my C which once I can afford will be getting removed as they feel awful

I'm more than happy with my Spax (poly and rubber on different cars) and protech (which are available with rubber, poly or rose jointed - mine are poly). I had an SS1 on AVO poly which had distorted and QRG sent me a full set of replacement bushes FOC (even though I hadn't bought them from him). My white SE5 (AAA) was on spax with poly many years ago and were fine when I sold it (the dampers would only have been about 2 years old though).

Had a set of the poor quality AVO bushes a while ago, AVO replaced foc with a metalastic type, when I rebushed the front suspension and repaired the rear axle mounts after they'd been fitted 3 or so years were still all good.

I was the first person to work with Protech to develope front and back shocks for the 6a. (Mr Avo was just starting to design for them after his bad experience of being pushed out of previous company(s). They used a Jaguar bush modified with extra bushes either side to get the correct width to fit between brackets + SPACERS and to fit the given pin size.......(it still does not seem to have got through that there was a Reliant modification that used spacers fitting into the brackets which meant the bushes were less wide than the SE5 ones........one trader told me to just put the spacers on the outside of the brackets, and another to just force the brackets apart to force the too long bushes into place.....NO NO NO bad engineering. Come on manufacturers make the bushes the correct length and composition........Protech gets my vote with their adjustable spring seat and single adjustment for damping and the bonded bushes modified to fit the Scim. The cost at the time was cheaper than some and more expensive than others (£100 a corner for shock and spring a good few years ago) I had asked for the smaller diameter springs for ease of obtaining.
I still have copies of the drawings they did and which they sent me.

I called AVO last Friday as they are based in the same town as me and requested 4 replacement bushes for the shocks. I told them that I expected much more than two years and very low mileage without experiencing failures as pictured. Their reply, Four replacement bushes can be collected and will cost you £40. Nigel QRG does not have any.

Mick Gaugh

Last edited by mick_gaugh on Mon Jul 17, 2017 4:57 pm, edited 2 times in total.